The Next Generation: Coco Gordon Moore
“My mom [Kim Gordon] was always a huge fashion icon for me. I try to incorporate parts of her style into my own,” says the heiress to art-rock royalty. Dressed in the season’s answers to rock ‘n’ roll romance, an undone mélange of Victorian and Americana codes, denim, and tattered textures, Coco Gordon Moore makes it all her own.
CURRENTLY BASED: Chicago, Illinois
STUDIES AT: The Art Institute of Chicago. I’m in my second semester of senior year. I’m back in Advanced Painting and that’s taking up most of my time. It’s just you working in the studio for seven hours, three days a week, and meeting with teachers. I’ll be doing that, and I have a drawing class that Daniel Garber, which I’m really excited about.
CHICAGO: It took a really long time to get used to. I like it as a city. It’s definitely a great place to go to school in, especially when you’re my age, it’s pretty cheap for a major city and stuff is great. But, I’m such an East Coast person; I’m definitely moving after I graduate.
DEVELOPING AS AN ARTIST: I think I always knew. Art and music were always part of my everyday life, obviously, with my parents. It was never something I decided. I just kind of knew I wanted to study that. Honestly, I really wanted to be a veterinarian [when I was a kid]. [laughs]
INFLUENCES: Obviously my mom, but that’s a given. I really love Rita Ackermann. Jutta Koether, Nick Mauss, Albert Oehlen. I definitely look at those artists a lot.
ART PRACTICE: [Working digitally] is actually super-recent. I used to do just painting and then drawing directly on the canvas or paper and then that was it. Then last semester, I was in Advanced Painting for the first time, so I wanted to try something that I haven’t before. I started doing these small drawings then, scanning them into my laptop and then printing them out much larger and trying to do installations. Text can always be interesting, like another way to make a mark, but I think it can also be really complicated.
They’re really difficult to use so I try not to go overboard. I try to use it when it’s really essential for the piece. People will always see the text and sometimes that’s all they want to talk about. They don’t even really think about the work as a whole anymore. So much of my work is personal, and a lot of my work is the past and memories, sometimes I need to use text to get a certain feeling across.
I have a sketchbook that I have so many drawings in, but I have one for when my mind’s wandering. A lot of my work is from me thinking about trying to figure out stuff in my past that maybe I’ve never come to a realization before, and trying to express that. I usually use that [notebook] if I want to start an idea.
DOWNTIME: Usually I just like stay at home with my roommates. I wish I could say something intelligent like we talk about art or something, but we really just watch TV and do stupid stuff and drink wine.
WHAT’S NEXT: I’m mostly excited to move, starting a new chapter of my life. My best friend lives in Massachusetts and we’re going to live together in New York. I’m excited to start doing that. I try to visit as much as possible.
